Only three other states have a lower percentage of uninsured adults than Wisconsin, according to a Gallup Survey released last Friday. The survey provides further evidence that BadgerCare Plus has been successful in offsetting the loss of employer-sponsored insurance during the recession. Wisconsin tied with Minnesota for the 4th lowest percentage of uninsured adults in the first half of 2010, according to Gallup. Their survey polled more than 176,000 adults nationally, including 1,857 in Wisconsin. Only Massachusetts, Vermont and Hawaii have lower rates of uninsured adult residents.

According to Gallup, the percentage of uninsured adults in Wisconsin has fallen from 10.9 percent in 2008 to 9.7 percent over the first half of this year (despite a spike in the first half of 2009), while the national average increased from 14.8 percent to 16.3 percent.

Wisconsin’s 4th place ranking this year is not surprising, since that’s very close to our state’s 5th place tie in the Census Bureau’s last American Community Survey (ACS), which estimated coverage of people of all ages in 2008. (See the WCCF blog post from last September.) What is surprising is that the Gallup data indicated that Wisconsin ranked 12th in the first half of 2009, with 12.6 percent of adults lacking health insurance.

I suspect that the substantial Wisconsin increase in the uninsured indicated by the Gallup data for 2009 was at least partially a statistical anomaly (sampling error).  Another possible factor is that the recession caused a large increase in uninsured adults in the first half of last year — particulalrly among childless adults because the BadgerCare Plus Core Plan didn’t begin until July.  We ought to be able to better assess what happened last year when the 2009 ACS results are released next month, and perhaps get a better handle on the quality of the Gallup health insurance data. 

At about the same time that Gallup released its 2010 survey data, the Census Bureau was releasing its Small Area Health Insurance Estimates (SAHIE) for 2007.  The SAHIE uses a wide variety of data sources to estimate insurance rates for all U.S. counties for people under age 65. The data plugged into the SAHIE computer models include the Current Population Survey, 2000 Census, the Census Bureau’s Population Estimates Program, the County Business Patterns data set, and administrative records, such as aggregated federal tax returns and Medicaid participation data.

An article in Monday’s Journal Sentinel analyzes the SAHIE data and reports on the higher percentages of uninsured residents in northern Wisconsin counties.

Jon Peacock, WCCF Research Director